Balder Ex-Libris

Author : Feuerlicht Maurice M.
Title : Where the jews fail
Year : 1937

Link download : Feuerlicht_Maurice_M_-_Where_the_jews_fail.zip

FAR BACK IN THE DIM recesses of my childhood memory there burns the recollection of knowledge - gleaned from many sources available to alert childish ears - that I was Jewish. More than that, I learned from countless dinner-table discussions and from my father's heated debates with evening callers that, somehow, Jews were different from other people and that there was a "Jewish problem." Through the years I heard much and read more about this "problem" and so I became keenly aware of the fact that, for some reason, the Jews are a people apart from their neighbors. As personal experience added the judgment of maturity to vicarious knowledge, two unfortunate facts became increasingly apparent.. First, Jews as a group do not act like normal people, and by "normal" I merely mean the majority of citizens. Second, nobody can make an honest effort to probe the secret of Jewish differentiation, lest his head figuratively roll in the sand. Jews, as a rule, are hypersensitive on the subject of their Judaism, even though they may never be quite sure just what their Judaism is. Consequently, Gentiles dare not discuss the topic in the light of healthy, helpful reason, lest they be accused of "prejudice." On the other hand, for many reasons, few Jews care to risk the storm of indignation sure to break on the head of any member of the group so rash as to express a sentiment other than bitter complaint against Jewish persecution by the world at large. The cry of "Renegade!" is not pleasant in sensitive ears. Before I commit myself, I too want to forestall some of the criticism I may receive, by pointing out that as the son of a rabbi and the product of a Jewish environment I am hardly prejudiced against Jews. Regardless of the nature of my own peculiarly personal religious views, I shall speak of "we Jews" throughout my discussion, in order to make it perfectly clear that I have no desire to avoid being known as a Jew. I do not believe there are any Jews at birth. The Jewish consciousness is given seed and cultivated consistently, however, from the moment the young Jew is capable of understanding the spoken word - perhaps before that. Every religious experience thereafter tends to remind him that he is not like his friends the Gentiles. Such was my own experience, which may be taken as typical in that I was raised with less than the usual orthodox Jewish inflexibility but with more training than that found in most Reformed Jewish homes. My earliest memory is the celebration of the Feast of Lights, or Hanukkah. I sat at my father's feet, as have countless other Jewish youngsters, and heard him tell the thrilling story of Judas Maccabeus and his brave band who risked their lives for their religion. Each year at Hanukkah. ...